Was climbing in Germany last year with a German mountain guide who explained that recent tests show that factor 2-ish forces are too much for a belayer to handle and that injury to the belayer would be likely - as well as dropping the leader. In Europe, where multipitch bolted climbs are so common, there is often less chance to place your own gear immediately off the anchor and so many pitches begin with a modest runout off a bolted anchor. The solution the guide suggested is that if you see the potential for a fall onto the anchor, then belay directly off the anchor with a munter for the first few pieces, and then run the rope through a device on your harness, flip the munter out of the system, and belay normally off your waist for the rest of the pitch. Here's a photo from Simon Mentz's Mt. Arapiles guidebook that reveals the issue - and this isn't even a factor 2 whipper...

Everybody around here (Munich) belays either off their body or the anchor with the Munter Hitch (they call it Halbmastwurf). I've gotten used to getting funny looks for carrying around an "unnecessary" ATC. :)

I think common sense would dictate that you don't belay off the anchor in uncertain alpine gear belays.

When I was guidint in Asia I had a guy that wanted to belay me this way. He had paid me to guide him up a "multi-pitch" and claimed to be very experienced in the mountains. But he couldn't climb for shit so I had to take up up a 45 meter 5.10 that has an intermediate anchor.

Anyways, once I began to lead the second pitch he wanted to belay me off the anchor on a munter. I understood the concept but thought that it would be awkward and didn't make much sense. He explained that it's better to have the load of a fall placed directly on the anchor. I don't think that is ideal in this situation but we were at a hanging belay and I had climbed the route about a hundred times so I told him to do what he wants and just went into "don't fall" mode like I think most guides do anyways.

But yea, I thought it looks awkward and contrived. It's not natural and it was obviously harder for him to feed out slack that it would have been had he just belayed me off his harness like he had when I was climbing the first pitch.

Was climbing in Germany last year with a German mountain guide who explained that recent tests show that factor 2-ish forces are too much for a belayer to handle and that injury to the belayer would be likely - as well as dropping the leader. In Europe, where multipitch bolted climbs are so common, there is often less chance to place your own gear immediately off the anchor and so many pitches begin with a modest runout off a bolted anchor. The solution the guide suggested is that if you see the potential for a fall onto the anchor, then belay directly off the anchor with a munter for the first few pieces, and then run the rope through a device on your harness, flip the munter out of the system, and belay normally off your waist for the rest of the pitch. Here's a photo from Simon Mentz's Mt. Arapiles guidebook that reveals the issue - and this isn't even a factor 2 whipper...

I hadn't thought about that but I guess it makes sense.

But when I know my leader will have a runout before the first piece of pro, I do this instead:

I usually clove to the anchor, so I just leangthen my teather quite a bit so that I am hanging well below the masterpoint. Then the leader places a draw on the masterpoint and clips it like his first piece. The lower I am, the lower the fall factor.

Wonder if the HMS on anchor is safer? I would think that the more rope out, the better, which is why I do it my way.

You guys spouting off physics non-sense are retarded, your assumptions assume that the munter (or other belay method) is 100% static, which it is very much not so. The dynamacy of the munter is what makes belaying the leader off the anchors reasonably possible.

I don't even know how to respond to that. I beg to differ though, you should try googling it and will find plenty of people using the word.

Oh look, another word that isn't in your webster, oh no..

A good deal of the responses here were made without much thought on how catching someone would actually go down using this method. Someone's talking about using their atc in guide mode, backwards. A few others posts are full of false assumptions, and just plain ol' nonsense.

I'm pretty sure that I've seen test results of an F2 fall on a Münter and they weren't pretty. With a human brake hand holding a locked Münter, the belayer was unable to stop, or even discernably slow down, an F2 fall. This is the the same result that occurs with a tube-style device. With the brake end of the rope held with a mechanical device to prevent any slipping, the rope breaks. I think you can find these tests on the UIAA site. Climb safe, Mal

Mal, I don't think this is entirely true. A few posts back, I posted a picture of a Munter on an anchor holding a factor-2 fall with steel weights, a situation more severe than with a falling body. Here's the video again:

youtube.com/watch?v=2c1LVgYf5v... frameborder='0'>

Note that there is hand movement but no rope slippage through the hand. That movement is critical, the testers know from long experience that it is critical, and they have set up the belay to allow for it. If the resisting hand can't move far enough, then there will be rope slippage, although that does not in and of itself mean the belay will fail.

Of course, the belayer is wearing a glove. If the rope does slip, then without a glove the belay is more likely to fail, and the belayer may experience serious burns.

Belayers using an ATC on their harness often have their braking hand inches from the device, so they are much more likely to experience rope slippage.

Strange as a direct leader belay off an anchor seems to Americans, there's nothing the matter with it in the European context of two beefy anchor bolts.

For those willing to spend half an hour watching people catch falls with Munters, there's also this recent video, made at a course for cavers. At some point they cut the sheath of the rope in two places and then drop the steel mass. They also compare to a Figure 8, they test the open-gate strength of a biner, and engage in other fun-to-watch activities. Fun for some of us, that is.

All the tests I´ve got (DAV, Manin,CAI etc) and my own tests give the HMS around 25 to 30% more braking power than normal belay devices.

The DAV has as usual been there and done that! (Panorama 05/2002). They did fall tests belaying direct from the anchor, from a powerpoint, inactive off the belayer and active from the belayer using HMS, Fig 8 and ATC. The highest force on the first runner was from the direct and the force reduction with the other methods -11%, -2% and -24%. The powerpoint belay gave considerable problems with uncontrolled movement of the belayer (who is naturally also attatched to the powerpoint) into the rock causing a real danger of loss of control and is not recommended for this reason. The recommendation is for an active body belay or direct from the anchor using an HMS to give sufficient braking power, in all cases if a large fall is to be expected belay gloves should be worn.

A powerpoint is where the connections to the belay gear all come to a central point which is not the belayer himself so the belay device is somewhere between the gear and the belayer, the situation you get when you use an equalette or similar.

An inactive belay is when the belayer makes no moves to reduce the impact by either controlled feed of the rope through the belay device or more commonly by moving towards the direction of pull.

I have 3 books which demonstrate the Munter, and it's stressed that you always use an HMS biner with it in each of them. Anyone who knows how to use the Munter should know that they are a pair and that this is the original reason for pear shaped biners.

To clarify Jim's comment about the "power point" belay, he is referring there to leader fall catches when their is gear higher up on the pitch, not to the factor-2 situation.

The problem with the power point belay when the device is on the power point is that the whole show will be jerked upwards until the power point slings become tight in the direction of an upward pull. The effect depends, of course, on how long those slings are.

Not sure why you would want to use a Munter, especially on multipitch. An ATC weighs very little and it is challenging enough to keep your ropes untwisted after 10 pitches. I couldn't imagine the frustration of using a Munter for that many pitches.

I climb to spend good time safely solving problems with good friends. Just like in life, there are trade-offs that need to be known in different methods. We ultimately decide what we deem acceptable or not.Instead of hating those who have differing views or opinions as mine, I will read and learn from what is said...both the sound and unsound comments. Thanks to all of you who have participated in "enlightening" me! Climb safe.

I do the same thing Ryan Williams mentions, and your follower should be cloved in the anchor anyways ja? So if fall is too much for belayer I always figured the anchor would catch them before they go too far up.

This is very interesting though, never thought so much in depth about it.. Something else to keep on the mind while leading I guess... (sarcastic) great..

At least with the ropes I have used, the Munter hitch "wants" to twist the rope while belaying. You have to kind of fight it with torque from your hands as you feed through. After a few pitches though, I started getting a few twists anyways.

Rapelling with a munter most certainly does twist the rope. I think a big biner and a thin rope might let you monster munter on a single line if you drop your belay device, but it would be slow.

i like how the guy from texas immediately talks shit, without providing any insight on the physics that others elaborate quite reasonably on. way to be a typical texan douchebag, you live up to the standard that you and your fellow statesmen have set.

In any case, I like knowing there are two human bodies absorbing the fall/distributing the force--rather than my human body cranking on a hard point--be it a Munter, Guide, or GriGri that's binding the rope.